the camp's regular troops, the internment camp included separate compounds for the prisoners within a stockade. Its facilities were intended to house and feed up to 3,000 the prisoners at a time. Seriously injured prisoners were treated at Wakeman Hospital. On 15 December 1942, the U.S. Army activated the 1537th Service Unit to perform duty at the prison camp. After receiving specialized training, the service unit arrived in February 1943 to prepare for the arrival of the prisoners of war. For the duration of its use, the internment camp was under the command of Lieutenant Colonel John L. Gammell. Father Maurice F. Imhoff, a Roman Catholic priest, was assigned as the camp's chaplain. The prison compound was equipped similarly to Camp Atterbury's other facilities; however, the U.S. Army service unit was housed outside the perimeter of the internment camp. Prisoners were organized into three battalions and the camp was divided into three sections. They worked as general camp laborers and at offsite locations, usually as agricultural laborers in groups of ten or more, accompanied by a military guard. Prisoners were paid eighty cents per day for their labor, in addition to a ten-cent per diem from the U.S. government. They were also allowed leisure time at the camp. The first group of 767 prisoners, most of them Italians, arrived on 30 April 1943, and another group of 400 arrived the following day. By September there were nearly 3,000 prisoners at the camp. All the Italian prisoners had been removed from Camp Atterbury by 4 May 1944. In 1943 Lieutenant Colonel John Gammel gave the Italian prisoners permission to erect a small chapel about from the internment compound. Dedicated to the Blessed Mother, it was named "The Chapel in the Meadow." The three-sided structure, which measured by , was built of brick and stucco from scrap materials found at the camp. The exterior had bright blue stucco walls and plain white columns. A cross surmounted the south end of its gable roof. The east and west sidewalls each had an opening in the shape of a cross. Its interior was decorated with a faux-painted marble altar installed at the back. Another altar was built for outdoor use. Religious paintings decorated the interior walls and ceiling. The "Chapel in the Meadow" was not demolished when the internment was dismantled, but it fell into disrepair and was vandalized after the war. The chapel